25 comments:

Matt
said...

ESPN had a 90 min Town Hall meeting on Michael Vick in the 6pm time-slot usually reserved for SportsCenter. SportsCenter was therefore moved to ESPN2 (why not ESPNEWS I have no idea.) To me, it shows exactly where NASCAR ranks on ESPN execs list of important sports. I highly doubt NFL Live or Baseball Tonight would have been pre-empted the way NASCAR Now was. NASCAR Now will air, by the way, at 12 midnight ET.

ESPN began the 6pm hour with breaking news about an NFL quarterback change. Then the show just turned into a regular edition of SportsCenter. There was however, at about 6:15 PM, a "Program Alert" ticker that said NASCAR Now will be shown at 12 AM, but no one in the ESPN studio actually said anything about. I should add that College Football Live was also postponed by SportsCenter and it will air tomorrow.

I tuned in right at 5:00 (Central time) and assumed the previous show ran long. Then the ESPN HD logo zoomed up and I thought NASCAR Now was starting and I didn't pay much attention. Then it went to a "Breaking News" flash and the host onscreen was defintely not Eric Kuselias or Brad Daugherty. He started talking about Lovie Smith and I thought he had been fired or died. But no, Lovie just decided to bench Rex Grossman this Sunday and start Brian Griese in his place.

ESPN2 was running a Program Alert on the bottom stating that NASCAR Now could be seen at Midnight tonight (Eastern time).

There was no mention by the SportsCenter announcer about NASCAR Now being pre-empted. At least none that I heard.

I guess ESPN didn't factor on such earth-shattering breaking news occuring today, since they were showing the Town Hall meeting on ESPN. And ESPNews was showing a rerun of Around the Horn, but I didn't check that channel to confirm it.

By the way, I always assumed NASCAR Now was broadcast live. Now I'm not so sure. Is it broadcast live, or is it pretaped?

I just tuned in to the midnight show but missed the beginning so I don't know if they explained any of this, but I doubt it.

I just caught the end of NASCAR Now and Eric Kuselias signed off with "Here comes SportCenter!" Well, he was wrong about that, too. The original 6:00pm airing should have been followed by "College Football Now" and the midnight airing is being followed by "The Contender".

If Mr. Kuselias has this much trouble reading a schedule....Ah, never mind.

Maybe he was told SportsCenter would pre-empt "College Football Now" and NASCAR Now would air as scheduled. Was ESPN afraid of being scooped on the Grossman benching and went on air a half hour early?

Just checked this show out a little after midnight to see if they talked about Carl's penalty.

THEN They talked about the young wonder boy Joey Lagano (sp?) and had an interview with him. SAY WHAT? This was nice to see but too bad the show featuring him was blown off for the minutia I am reading ESPN had as "BREAKING NEWS"

They have several channels, why do they ALL have to focus on the same breaking storie. It's garbage stuff (OJ or Vick) or some quarterback changes? I dunno..did not have the tv on.

I kind of listened to part of the show and turned it off after the young interview with Joey segment was over. Maybe I was just shocked but it SEEMED like Erik was not being so HOSTILE and edgy about stuff? He was nicer last week when I saw the "jr show" with Rick Hendrick...and then I think I caught part of Monday's show..and Eric was not as SHOUTY as usual.

Well I *did* get the early airing of NN but only because I DVR Ray Evernham's show.

I was watching Oprah and it flipped over and I hear Erik saying something about "and a recap of our top story...yada yada yada". At first I thought something huge happened that I missed that caused it to be an hour show (as it has done a few times) but then a bit later he signed off advising us that SportsCenter was coming up and they'd be back to their regular time on Wednesday.

It does get frustrating when things you *expect* to be on at a certain time is changed with nary an explanation.

I watched at 5:30ET. Sportscenter came on at 6pm. I imagine Sportscenter didn't get bumped to ESPNews because ESPNews isn't available in HD, and Sportscenter is an HD show. I imagine that ESPN made their scheduling decisions for ESPN2 late yesterday or early today. Otherwise, I'm pretty sure today's showtime would've been mentioned yeserday.

I don't think this has as much to do with NASCAR as it does with all ESPN sports specific shows. Anyone ever tune in for Baseball Tonight only to find out it's 20 minutes long and doesn't even show every game. Just a few highlights, an MVP debate, and a bunch of scoreboards.

Oh, I don't think anyone has mentioned this, but this was a last-minute decision by ESPN. The on-screen guide listed NASCAR Now and College Football Live (which was a re-air) in the time slot that was given to SportsCenter.

Since the "town hall meeting" about Michael Vick was presented under the SportsCenter name, I thought there were be several inserts of current sports news during the program. Instead - and there was no compelling reason behind it - an entire second SportsCenter aired on ESPN2.

I missed both broadcasts, but I trust from the other users that it aired, so at least there was a show last night.

SportsCenter has aired on ESPNEWS before, as late as April during the NBA playoffs, so "no HD capabilities on ESPNEWS" is not an excuse.

By the way: I put "town hall meeting" in quotes in this case because it resembled a Michael Vick pep rally at times.

I got several emails that said the early edition aired at 5:30PM. Can anybody verify that? When I watched the overnight airing the host said they had been on at a special time and then he lead to the wrong program. I assumed they had been pushed thirty minutes earlier as several emailers had said. Anyone? Anyone?

Desmond's right. NASCAR Now aired at 5:30 on ESPN (though the program guide didn't show that)--I only caught it by accident. Kuselias, as usual, said nothing about the change. My guess is the show was taped around 3:30 or 4 PM and then they jiggled things around to show the Town Hall thingy in HD. At the end of the show, Kuselias made a ref to "back to our usual time on Wednesday." Very unusual not to have the DirecTV guide updated--ESPN's program guide usually is very accurate unless an event runs way over...

JD, Speaking of NASCAR TV, What do you think of ESPN's new series "NASCAR: Chasing Glory"? It's like kind of like "survival of the fastest" and it seems pretty good so far. Its airing right now at 5:30.

Whoa!!! ESPN2 just aired a promo for SportsCenter. They said it is next at 6PM. How is this possible when Erik said NASCAR Now would be back at it's normal time today and TV Guide Online says NASCAR Now is next?

JD:On tuesday, ESPN2 has a program at 5:30pm on Ray Evernham which I also DVRed. When I went to watch NN. I got the Sportscenter programing as well. I then went to view the Evernham program and guess what - NN instead!(no idea whatever happened to the Evernham program). This on Time-Warner cable in Dayton, Ohio.Tom in Dayton.